


Tantalus

by Clair de Lune (clair_de_lune)



Category: Prison Break
Genre: Alternate Canon, Gen, Post-Series
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-03-27
Updated: 2016-03-27
Packaged: 2018-05-29 12:48:02
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 704
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/6375340
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/clair_de_lune/pseuds/Clair%20de%20Lune
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>After, when everything is over and settled, when everybody is okay and secure, she pays her a visit in prison. (Post-series)</p>
            </blockquote>





	Tantalus

**Author's Note:**

> Written in 2009 for pbhiatus_fic's Bechdel Test Challenge at LiveJournal. Many thanks to Foxriverinmate for the beta.  
> (This was written before the show ended so, of course, it veers off canon.)

After, when everything is over and settled, when everybody is okay and secure, she pays her a visit in prison. She submits to the same kind of security procedures she’d seen dozens and dozens of people going through. She walks through the same kind of corridors and rooms she’d been working in for three years. She breathes in the heavy air and, even though this is a women’s facility not a men’s one, she recognizes the scent from her days at Fox River – stench and resignation and lack of hope.

She’s not sure what she’s trying to accomplish here. Not sure whether this is pettiness, retribution or merely the irrepressible need to make sure that the woman is here, locked and watched the way she should be.

She used to feel compassion for the people who were brought to her handcuffed and tripping over shackles. She watches Gretchen shuffle towards the seat in the small glass visiting booth and can’t feel the faintest trace of pity within her. She wonders if it makes her a hypocrite, not to care because she’s been personally involved and hurt. Maybe it’s normal; maybe it’s just the difference between justice and revenge.

“Hello, Sara. How are you doing?” Gretchen gazes at her, slightly bending her head to the side, her expression concerned. She doesn’t wear any make up and it makes her eyes look like they’re the only bright color in her otherwise pale face. “You don’t look too well. Is this place bringing up old memories? Bad ones?”

Even now, she’s so casual and laid back and brash, Sara wants to break the heavy, dirty glass that separates them and reach for her. She wonders what she would do then, though. Maybe she says that aloud because Gretchen smiles at her.

“You should have taken up on my offer back in LA. Whip me; whip this out of your system. You’d feel better by now. Trust me on that,” she says then asks with a patronizing little sigh, “Do you even know why you came, Sara?”

The reminder startles her. The question, laden with condescension, makes her jolt on her chair.

“Michelle,” she says. She’d swear that Gretchen rolls her eyes at her answer, and since it’s definitely not the kind of response she wants, she adds, “Emily.”

And now, Gretchen is still smiling but her smirk has faltered and is plastered to her face, her expression frozen and guarded.

“You remember Michelle and what I told you, don’t you?”

“Our few and short conversations were memorable,” Gretchen assures her sarcastically.

“I don’t believe in the death penalty. Even now.”

“One of the many things we disagree about, I guess. Granted, I was usually the one dispensing the penalty so I may be biased about the whole thing.”

The smart-ass retort is murky with uneasiness, even a hint of fear – Gretchen is faking it, and Sara doesn’t pay attention to her show of attitude.

“So I’m going to do whatever is in my power so that you’re not sentenced to death. Then I’m going to do whatever is in my power so that your daughter can’t visit you. By the time she’s an adult and can make her own decisions, maybe she will come and see you or maybe she won’t. Either way, she will have grown up free of your influence and you will have seen none of it. None of her. You will have to be content with pictures and letters. If your sister feels like sending them. And let me tell you something because I’ve witnessed it first hand: it’s a real Tantalus’ torture.”

The bright blue eyes bore into hers, helpless and frenzied for the first time since Sara sat on the other side of the glass. Just as she used to feel compassion for the people who were brought to her handcuffed and shackled, she used to feel sympathy for those who looked at her that way.

“You’ve really become a little pesky, vengeful thing, huh?” Gretchen finally spits.

She studies the woman in front of her and feels nothing but the relief – she’s quite grateful that it is relief, not actual satisfaction – of the job done.

“Only for you, Gretchen.”

-End-


End file.
